


as above ; so below

by tiredhealer



Category: Brighthearth, Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game), Original Work, The KBCU (Kris Brain Cinematic Universe)
Genre: Gen, Pre Canon, aureli is fifteen and baby and not a total rat bastard yet, how to become a warlock 101: watch your brother die and sell his soul by mistake, to the tune of how i met your mother: how i met my patron
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-08
Updated: 2020-09-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:20:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26360290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiredhealer/pseuds/tiredhealer
Summary: Aureli is fifteen. In some small part of their heart after this day, they will always be fifteen. A part of them will never leave this beach.(or: on losing your brother and becoming something new.)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 4





	as above ; so below

Their brother dies in summer.

Aureli is fifteen. In some small part of their heart after this day, they will always be fifteen. A part of them will never leave this beach.

For now they’re shivering, their sandaled feet half-buried in the sand as they stare at the ocean ahead of them. Summer in Blithe is warm, often sweltering, the heat in Pleasure made only more bearable by the breeze off of the sea. The heat means they often get storms, and today the ocean is grey and dark. The waves are choppy, rising higher than Aureli is tall. They shiver in their chiton and clutch the fabric tighter around them.

‘Are you sure we should be doing this?’

Ahead of them, their brother sheds his toga and lets it drop in a heap into the sand, leaving him just in cloth shorts to swim in. He kicks off his sandals and turns to face them with a smile. ‘You worry too much!’

Aureli eyes the sea as a wave rises up to swallow the horizon. ‘No, I believe my worry is at an entirely appropriate amount.’

‘It’s no use only learning to swim when the sea is calm, Aureli,’ he says, taking steps into the shallows and letting the sea lap around his ankles. ‘If you’re thrown off of a ship do you imagine it will be because there are calm waters?’

He’s right, of course, and the entire point of these visits are to learn to swim. Pleasure is a port town, and if they ever want to go to Capital they’re obviously going to do it by boat. So they have to learn.

But that doesn’t mean they want to go in the ocean.

‘But I don’t want to learn like this,’ they mutter. ‘It’s too cold. I’ll get sick.’

Again. That’s the unspoken part, but the truth, they can catch a cold in a warm room. If they get bronchitis again it will be the third time this year and they can’t stand the thought of more long weeks in bed with sickness tearing at their lungs.

‘Get in the water then! It will warm you!’ Clarence calls back over his shoulder. He wades in deeper and the water turns the pale cotton of his breeches grey.

‘No, it won’t.’

‘Well, we’re not leaving until you swim at least a little!’

Aureli pouts. Clarence is as stubborn as they are, they know he won’t budge on this. He’ll make them wait here until they swim or die of cold on the shore. They should have known better than to leave the estate with him today. They’ve only been coming out here for as long as they have because Clarence is Clarence and they will follow him to the end of the world. But that was when it was hot, when the ocean was actually a pleasant change.

Too late, they notice him stooping then sweeping up his arms at speed. He sends a wave of water towards them and it hits them hard, so cold it feels like shards of ice slapping against their skin. Aureli screams as the cold burrows beneath their clothes and along their hairline.

‘I’m going to kill you!’

‘Oh, you are? You’ll have to come catch me then won’t you!’

Aureli wades into the shoals. The water pools around their feet, their ankles, the curve of their calves. Unlike their brother they swim in their chiton, too self-conscious of the jut of their ribs and the bumps of their spine to ever shed a layer that might leave them exposed.

Clarence laughs and wades away. Aureli pursues.

  
The water stings as it bites around their knees and up along their thighs as they wade deeper into the surf. They stumble in the softness of the sand, their cane left by their sandals. Their legs are unsteady without them. Their teeth are chattering, the sensation worsening as they follow their brother deeper into the waves.

  
He eventually stops once the water is up to their chin. He’s only two years older than them but at seventeen he looks a man grown already; his shoulders broad, his stubble blooming into the beginnings of a beard. His hair is the same white silver as theirs and hangs around his shoulders.  
  
‘See? Isn’t that better?’  
  
Aureli splashes water in his face. But they’re both laughing as they push against the roll of the waves to move deeper into the ocean. Aureli pauses on the edge where the sand falls away, where they will have to give their body to the current. Clarence lets himself float with ease. Aureli is not sure they will ever feel comfortable letting the sea carry them.  
  
‘You’re fine,’ he reassures, reading the stiffness in their shoulders. ‘Here, I’ve got you.’  
  
He tucks his hands under Aureli’s armpits and they let themself take the final step out into the open. The sudden lack of surety beneath their feet is always overwhelming. It feels as if they will fall and never stop, that the ocean will devour them whole.  
  
Clarence holds them carefully, his fingers a comforting pressure without digging in painfully. He lets Aureli take a few uncertain kicks before he lets them go and they resist the urge to reach for him, to cling. They are not a child, they will not act like one. No matter how much they want to.  
  
The waves rock against their front and rise all around them, strong enough to push them deeper in.  
  
‘Are you sure we should be out here?’ Aureli says. The sky is so dark above them that even though it’s only midday it feels like dusk. ‘It looks like it’s going to storm.’  
  
‘We won’t go too far in. It’s good to have practise swimming in rough tides, you never know when a ship might capsize.’  
  
Aureli shudders at the thought. ‘I don’t intend to go sailing any time soon.’  
  
‘But you want to go to Capital, don’t you? Come on, follow me.’ Clarence turns and takes strong sweeps through the water.  
  
Aureli fumbles to keep up. The water keeps sloshing around their face, pushing into their eyes and mouth. Their legs ache at the effort of keeping themselves up. Swimming is easier on their body than anything else but that is not saying much. For Clarence, it looks easy. Their brother makes everything look easy.  
  
They shake their head, not wanting to let the bitterness take root. Clarence has looked after them when even their own mother wouldn’t. It’s good that he’s strong and healthy and happy, to begrudge them that would be a wicked thing.  
  
A wave hits them hard. It knocks Aureli sideways and sends their world spinning and as they flounder another wave hits and pushes them beneath the water. Their eyes burn at the clash of salt water but they dare not close their eyes. They inhale water and everything is black, the sea is so dark, it is an endless abyss.  
  
Strong arms grab them and lift. Clarence holds them tight against him and Aureli clings to his shoulders, wheezing and spitting.  
  
‘You’re alright,’ he soothes. ‘I’ve got you.’  
  
Another wave hits them both. Aureli slips from Clarence’s grasp just for a moment – it is enough to make panic take root. Their brother grabs them and pulls them back to him, back to the light.  
  
‘I don’t like this,’ they say. ‘Please, let’s go home.’  
  
Up close, there is no hiding the unease on their brother’s face. It makes panic beat in Aureli’s chest like a wild thing. If Clarence is afraid –  
  
‘We’re fine,’ he says and tightens his hold on Aureli. ‘We’ll head back now.’  
  
But the ocean does not want to let them. It rises around them and the tide pulls at them, tears them apart. Aureli’s fingers slide over Clarence’s arms, trying to find purchase, trying to grip, but another wave hits and throws them both away.  
  
‘Clarence!’ they scream as they surface.  
  
There – he’s there. Aureli struggles towards him, and Clarence turns, stroking the wet hair from his face.  
  
‘No Aureli – go back! Towards the shore!’  
  
His voice is lost to another sweep of black water. It pushes Aureli down, fills their throat and lungs and it is cold enough to burn. They feel the sea bed beneath their feet and push themselves up back to sunlight. It isn’t far. It feels like miles.  
  
They break the surface with a gasp and Clarence is there, just out of reach. He lunges for them. Aureli grabs at him and the next waves shoves them under the water together. They rise and there is just enough time to take a shuddering breath before it hits them again and the world is swallowed by dark.  
  
‘Aureli!’ they hear Clarence’s voice the next time they push back to the surface, but they can’t see him. They’re so far out now the beach is a thin line in the distance. How did that happen?  
  
‘Clarence?’  
  
No answer but the cruel spit of the sea.  
  
‘Clarence! Please!’  
  
The next wave hits like a physical blow. Aureli tastes blood mixed with the salt water in their mouth. The sea pulls at them, sucking at their ankles. It’s as if something is beneath the waves, trying to pull them under.  
  
Clarence pulls them back to the surface and clutches at them. His weight is enough to let them withstand the next wave. ‘I’m sorry,’ he says against their hair. ‘I didn’t think – it looked a little choppy. Nothing like this. I’m going to get us back to shore.’  
  
Aureli only sobs. Their fingers clutch at their brother’s arms hard enough to leave angry red indentations.  
  
The next sweep of water rolls over the horizon. Aureli clings tighter to Clarence and hopes it will be enough.  
  
It is not enough.  
  
They are split apart, the two pushed down into the dark. Neither resurface.  
  
 *****  
**  
Flowers.  
  
Aureli wakes laying in a field of flowers. Slowly, they ease into a sitting position. The ache from their lungs is gone. Their chiton is dry around their knees.  
  
‘Clarence?’ they call.  
  
Getting up is no more effort than usual. Where are they? They had been in the sea. They had been with their brother.  
  
This isn’t the sea. This is – it almost looks like the small rose garden their mother kept in the courtyard, only stretched out to cover the world from horizon to horizon. There are roses of a dozen different colours – some that they’re sure aren’t even real colours.  
  
But they don’t smell of roses. They smell of salt water, the murky stench of brine.  
  
‘Aureli.’  
  
It’s their mother’s voice. She has been gone five years now but Aureli would know it anywhere; the soft, lilting cadence, the gentleness no-one else ever showed them.  
  
They twist in place, but there is nobody there.  
  
‘Mother?’ they call.  
  
Above the sky is endless brilliant blue. Aureli watches as two songbirds dance above them, one blue, one almost a gold. They twist around each other then carry on towards the horizon, away from them.  
  
Aureli takes another slow turn. They are alone amidst the sea soaked roses. And yet on the breeze carries the hum of a harp – it is one of their mother’s songs. She used to play it when they couldn’t sleep.  
  
Aureli follows the sound, trailing their way through the lines of flowers from red bulbs to unfurling blue petals to green strands reaching for the sky. They walk until their legs tremble, under their back aches, until their lungs feel heavy. And yet it is further than they’ve ever walked without their cane.  
  
The music swells. They reach the line of the horizon and the field falls away into blackness.  
  
‘Aureli.’  
  
A different voice this time. It is not one they know. A woman’s voice, laced with sugar and honey. A woman’s voice from right behind them.  
  
Aureli turns. But again there is nothing, only endless darkness now stretching out all around. It is like walking the house at night, but not. The darkness is total and complete save for one slither of light that floats in the distance.  
  
‘Who’s there?’ they say. They try to be brave. But their voice trembles.  
  
No reply. But from above, there comes a trickle like rain. Aureli tips their head back. Water begins to pour down into the space with them. It covers their feet, pools around their ankles, chills the curve of their calves.  
  
‘Aureli,’ their brother echoes from beneath the rising black tide. ‘I’m sorry.’  
  
‘Clarence?’  
  
Suddenly, their lungs heave and they stagger to their knees, retching bile and salt water. The tide rises around them, wrapping itself around the jut of their shoulders.  
  
‘Clarence,’ they rasp. ‘Please, where are you?’  
  
The water rises and rises and Aureli struggles back to their feet to try and escape it. It clings to them like tar, like fingertips trying to drag them down.  
  
They start to move, wading towards the slither of light in the distance. But their steps are slow and heavy and it is rising too fast. They won’t make it. They’re going to die here, trapped in the dark and the damp and nobody will even know where they are.  
  
‘Oh Aureli,’ the woman’s voice again, smooth and sing-song sweet. ‘You look so frightened.’  
  
They know better than to look behind them now. ‘Who are you? What do you want?’  
  
From the great darkness a wave rises and hits them hard in the stomach. They are soaked and shivering and their legs cannot handle the weight of another step. But they have to. They have to find Clarence, the big fool with his dreams of becoming Jarl and his love of the lute and -  
  
‘It’s not about what I want Aureli,’ the voice coos. ‘What about what you want, hm?’  
  
‘I want this to be over.’  
  
‘Do you want to die?’  
  
The water rises up the ridge of their collarbone. ‘No.’ _I want my brother. I want to go home. I want to be safe and away from the sea and never see another damn wave in my entire life._  
  
‘Wouldn’t you like to live?’  
  
The water is such a heavy weight. They cannot stand it. Their chiton feels as if it is made of stone, pulling them down. ‘Yes.’  
  
‘What would you be willing to give for it?’  
  
In the distance, the light is starting to dim. Aureli pictures what it would be to be alone in this place in the dark. Their chest tightens.  
  
‘Anything.’  
  
‘Anything?’  
  
The water is up to their chin. It laps against the press of their mouth.  
  
‘Anything, please. Please don’t leave me here.’  
  
The water stops. Aureli does too. The light in the distance goes out.  
  
‘No,’ they plead with the dark. ‘Don’t leave me down here.’  
  
‘Don’t worry Aureli.’ Hands touch their waist from behind, sliding round to their stomach to hold them tight. Aureli looks down and sees pale forearms, delicate hands and nails painted blood red. ‘You’ll never be alone again. I’m here now.’  
  
They are pulled backwards. They fall, through the water, through darkness, and when it seems like they might never see the sky again, they do.  
  
And they are not alone.  
  



End file.
